The last thing he needed, the very last thing, was to have involved himself in a discussion about equality, race and class. The very things that set him off into wild rages with explosive results. The things that reminded him of the very real class warfare waged against his family for generations. The kind of warfare that involved actual weapons employed against him and his family members, whatever was readily available, and wielded with a strong arm and iron fist. And when her arm got tired, she could always send in a few assassins to finish the job. When Remy was banished from the Thieves' Guild for what he did, he at least could claim to no longer serve her, Candra. But when she demanded recompense for the assassin she'd lost to Remy's poor swordsmanship, and all the clans combined could not afford to pay, he had little choice but to find himself trapped under her heel once more. For three unbearably long years.

Spending his nights with the outrageously powerful: Externals, Hellfire Club, oligarchs, CEOs of multinational business conglomerates, Washington politicians, Saudi princes, Hollywood weirdos. All of them soulless sharks circling one another sniffing for blood. Candra loved to dress Remy up and position him in front of some vapid, moronic, moneyed blowhard, who talked and talked and talked about himself. And had nothing at all to say. With a bloated face and bloated ego, heard only himself speak, saw only the little line that indicated his net worth. All of it filling Remy with a blind impotent rage, only to have Candra release him into the world to see what he'd do with his hatred.

You know, for fun.

Once at a dinner party, guests were lauding a former president with glory. Remy had exploded, informing the table that their god was a warmongering phony cowboy riding in on a Trojan Horse called Racism and he and his wife and their war on drugs could just go get fucked. There was absolute silence for one perfect moment. He was promptly escorted from the room, but not before hearing a wine glass shatter on the floor, followed by the echoes of Candra's laughter.

"Oh, you dear sweet heart," Candra told him later, in a motherly voice as directed to a very small child. "Don't you know how silly it is..to get mad at this president - or that president? Their terms are just so short! And you know why that is, dear one? It's bureaucracy instilled in a system to attempt to slow the inevitable failure of Democracy and the backwards slide into oligarchical or monarchical rulership! Maybe even fascist dictatorial regime! But don't you worry your sweet head over it. It will all be over soon. I will give it until 2030! And that's me being generous!"

With that she tapped Remy on the nose with her finger and said: "Boop!"

Remy heard music then, like he always did: You know you can't hold me forever. I didn't sign up with you. I'm not a present for your friends to open. This boy's too young to be singing...the blues…

Remy would much prefer dealing with Sabretooth than those people, because at least with Creed, you knew what you were getting yourself into.

So goodbye yellow brick road. Where the dogs of society howl. You can't plant me in your penthouse. I'm going back to my plough...

When Rogue began to talk, he realized he'd grossly underestimated her. She was not some naive girl. Though he partly wondered if he weren't painting her as more mature than she was; the excuse of every adult man who wanted to get into the pants of a teenage girl. She was so mature for her age, I swear, officer, said every pervert ever. Shaking himself free of this thought, he brought his mind back to the way she spoke, her passion for her topic. She may have derived her inspiration from a leader, a dreamer (Xavier?), but when she spoke it was with her own voice. She was not parroting the opinions of adults, but speaking from the true knowledge of experience.

She hadn't known him for but an hour and had shown him her heart. He could have reached out and crushed it with the weight of all he'd seen. But she had something he didn't: passion. Whereas he had only anger. He'd destroyed enough things, and he loved her beautiful heart whole. He admired her hope for the future of society. He had hope too, but for the individual, not the whole. The whole was mindless and greedy. The person was thoughtful and generous.

When Greycrow saved his life from either being broiled by the desert or frozen by it, Remy tried, really tried to not see the man as a lost cause. To see the good in someone. He needed a microscope. An electron microscope. He did not like the man, Greycrow. Remy was pretty sure he was a murderer for hire. But he thought if he could just set the man's feet on the right path and send him down a few steps, he'd realize it was a much easier road to walk. Remy would later come to realize that he truly was a sap, sucker, completely gullible.

Remy was wedged between a rock and a hard place. He had barely enough strength to crawl to the granite outcropping and hide himself there, willing the flames in his chest to die down. They didn't die down, they grew and consumed him. And this time, instead of exploding out, he exploded in. He looked down the front of his tee-shirt to see his white heart alight and glowing through his skin.

E.T. ...phone...home?

Well, this was a new and alarming development. Essex was wrong about something though. Remy wasn't going to obliterate himself. He was going to obliterate everything else, leaving himself stranded on an empty wasteland of a planet with no one but himself to blame. Like the Little Prince, only no shooting star was going to come and take him away. He was the star. And he'd be there, alone, for a million billion years until he eventually collapsed on himself and turned into a dense black void of warped reality.

Was he going to fall into despair? No. That is not the way he did things. Not if there was some small shred of hope. He'd seen it in Rogue's eyes. Xavier the man may be gone, but his ideas were alive. And maybe Remy would find some clue, some additional research, in the man's files. Something to give him a lead to the next idea, the next discovery. That was the thing about knowledge, like the universe, there was always more and more.

Next: Entering and Breaking

Thank you guest reviewers, I truly appreciate your kind words and encouragement. Two more chapters heading your way this weekend.